Sridevi (1963-2018)http://www.openthemagazine.com/taxonomy/term/25992/feed
enFarewell, Our Chandni of Moonlit Romancehttp://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/farewell-our-chandni-of-moonlit-romance
<p>I HAVE ONE IMAGE ON the bedroom wall. It is a poster of Sridevi as Chandni, stretching her lovely figure in a white salwar kameez, encased in a pink rose with dewdrops. I have other posters of her, including one of her famous dance of passion with Rishi Kapoor and Vinod Khanna behind her, but this is the image of her that I treasure most. Moonlight and roses.</p>
<p>Shree Amma Yangar Ayyappan, better known as Sridevi, was born on August 13th, 1963, in her father’s home town, Sivakasi, Tamil Nadu, famous for its fireworks. Her father, Ayyappan Yangar, was a lawyer, her mother a Telugu speaker from Tirupati. Her mother, Rajeswari Yangar, managed her career, introducing her as a four-year old into a Tamil devotional film, MA Thirumugham’s <em>Thunaivan</em> (1969), playing Lord Murugan. (Thirumugham is known in Hindi cinema as the director of <em>Haathi Mere Saathi</em>.)</p>
<p>Sridevi continued her career as a child artist in South Indian cinema, in which she appeared throughout her professional life—in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada films. She made her debut in Hindi movies playing Julie’s younger sister, Irene, in KS Sethumadhavan’s <em>Julie</em> (1975). Her first role as a leading heroine in a Hindi movie was in <em>Solva Sawan</em> (1979), P Bharathiraja’s remake of his Tamil film, <em>16 Vayathinile</em> (1977) in which she had starred with Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth.</p>
<p>The gap in my knowledge about this era in South Indian cinema is such that I cannot argue with advocates of each of these cinemas who say her work in those movies was her best. It is plausible, given the limits of her Hindi, but a more interesting argument is made by the leading Tamil film critic, Baradwaj Rangan, who suggests one of the keys to her success is that she learned her acting style here, a filmi or melodramatic style. This meant she communicated directly with her audiences through her emotionally-charged performances that were always larger than life. Sridevi’s romance, her happiness, her sadness, her comedy were all conveyed directly to the audience.</p>
<p>Sridevi’s style is distinctive and extraordinary. A key part of it is her ability to communicate emotions with her face and with her body. She could change expressions as quickly as clouds pass over the sun. In moments, it could change from sad, happy, adoring or scared to surprise. Her huge eyes with long lashes seem too exaggerated to be real, and when she rolls them in silliness, winks in naughtiness or fills them with tears, they are unmissable. She wrinkles her nose and pouts, bites her lip and smiles. Each gesture is immediately recognisable, her often heavy make-up amplifying her look.</p>
<p>Sridevi was relatively tall with a strong body, originally known as ‘Thunder thighs’; she was always slim-waisted yet full-figured. In Western or Indian clothes, she always looked elegant and in later years modelled Indian designer couture but also dressed as Charlie Chaplin in Shekhar Kapur’s <em>Mr India</em> (1987), to everyone’s amusement. In her songs, she wore iconic outfits, such as her transparent raincoat in <em>Chaalbaaz </em>(1989)––actress, song and costume in harmony.</p>
<p>Perhaps her inimitable, effervescent style and often offbeat and quirky costumes were part of what made her songs so memorable and long-lived. While Sridevi’s command of Hindi was so weak in her early years that she had to be dubbed, when Lata Mangeshkar or Kavita Krishnamurthy sang for her, she escaped this trap and could mime to their voices. She was then free to put everything into her performance— to dance, to pose, to move, to emote.</p>
<p>Sridevi’s songs, however sexy the lyrics or the dancing, did not make her appear cheap. She always had an innocence and decency about her, such that however the viewer was positioned to look at her, she refused to be objectified. Even her most erotic dances were dignified and tasteful. Her snake dance for <em>Main Teri Dushman</em> in the film <em>Nagina</em> (1986), which might have been comical if badly done, mixed anger and eroticism in this deadly number.</p>
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<p>Sridevi’s beauty and sexual attractiveness was exaggerated further by her costumes, for example her gold dress first seen in close-up on her rear in <em>Hawa Hawai</em>, or the blue sari in which she dances erotically in Kaate Nahin Katte, both from Mr India</p>
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<p>Sridevi’s beauty and sexual attractiveness was exaggerated further by her costumes, for example her gold dress first seen in close-up on her rear in <em>Hawa Hawai</em>; or her blue sari in which she dances erotically in <em>Kaate Nahin Katte</em>, both from <em>Mr India</em>. One of my personal favourites was in <em>Mitwa</em> from Yash Chopra’s <em>Chandni</em> (1989), where she held up the <em>pallu</em> of her yellow chiffon sari and swayed as Rishi Kapoor looked on before they danced across fields, then walked arm in arm. In her double role in Chopra’s <em>Lamhe</em> (1991), she appeared in a Rajasthani dress as well as jeans and T- shirts, but her blue and yellow outfit in the desert song, <em>Morni Bag Ma Bole</em>, where Sridevi plays a Rajasthani woman interpreting a folk song to Anil Kapoor, an innocent tourist.</p>
<p>Sridevi was a great superstar, but by no means the first superstar. Sulochana (Ruby Meyers) is often described as the first, followed by many more such as ‘Fearless’ Nadia, Nargis, Madhubala, Meena Kumari and more. Sridevi is most often compared to other South Indian stars. We were reminded of Hema Malini’s performance in <em>Seeta aur Geeta</em> in <em>Chaalbaaz</em> (1989), a double role of twins separated at birth, and Vyjayanthimala’s snake dance <em>Mere Mann Dole</em> can be compared to Sridevi’s in <em>Nagina</em>. Although Raakhee’s character in <em>Daag</em> (1973) was called Chandni, it was Rekha in <em>Silsila </em>(1981) who was first presented as Chandni (or ‘moonlight’), Yash Chopra’s ideal of feminine beauty; she was his original choice for the title role of <em>Chandni</em>, but this is one of Sridevi’s greatest roles. She soon became a true Yash Chopra heroine, a romantic idealised woman in her elegant chiffon saris, manifesting grace and self- sacrifice, along with her ability to surmount suffering.</p>
<p>Perhaps it is more significant to note that in the 1980s, the female-centric films were more the ‘rape revenge’ dramas, including Sridevi’s own <em>Sherni</em> (1988), but she also played more fun and romantic roles where she shone even-paired with top stars.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Sridevi’s songs, however sexy the lyrics or the dancing, did not make her appear cheap. She always had an innocence and decency about her, such that however the viewer was positioned to look at her, she refused to be objectified</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In the south, she and Kamal Haasan were seen as a perfectly balanced pair, known best in the north for <em>Sadma</em> (1983), and the south Indian remakes with Jeetendra such as <em>Himmatwala</em> (1983) and <em>Tohfa</em> (1984). Rishi Kapoor and Sridevi were well matched in Nagin and Chandni, while Sridevi even withstood the phenomenal stardom of Amitabh Bachchan in <em>Khuda Gawah</em> (1992), her songs again finding popularity far beyond the cinema hall.</p>
<p>Anil Kapoor made a great co-star with Sridevi. Although he played Mr India, his role demanded that he was often invisible and it was Sridevi who stole the show in this perennially popular film. Shekhar Kapur mixed genres of sci-fi and <em>The Sound of Music</em> and gave us one of Hindi screen’s greatest villains, Mogambo, who was so often very happy: “Mogambo <em>khush hua</em>”. Amrish Puri made a great enemy for Sridevi, as he was also in <em>Nagin.</em></p>
<p>Sridevi acted with Anil Kapoor in<em> Laadla</em> (1994), but by the time <em>Judaai </em>(1997) released, Sridevi and Anil Kapoor’s brother, Boney Kapoor, were together, and I recall someone in the cinema hall in which I viewed it yelling, “<em>Bhabhi par haath na lagaana</em>!” to vast amusement. She also played a number of double roles in her films such as <em>Chalbaaz, Khuda Gawah, Lamhe,</em> allowing audiences to see different aspects of her performance.</p>
<p>The tributes to Sridevi this week have shown that she was an idol for many of the current generation of stars. It is hard to see a direct connection between her performance style and theirs, but it would be impossible for them not to want to achieve the status Sridevi had in the industry as a top star and a favourite heroine. Madhuri Dixit was perhaps the last female star who didn’t need a great co-star to lead a film.</p>
<p>One of the strange features of stardom is that one feels one knows someone intimately when one doesn’t know them at all. While it would be disturbing if someone couldn’t recognise the difference between the onscreen and offscreen person, there is some way in which we are haunted by these stars whom we have often never met. <em>The way in which we know their faces which we have seen magnified to the size of a cinema screen while we focus on their emotional states</em>.</p>
<p>We often feel as we know Sridevi as we have spent so many hours watching her films. We know her performances. We know the stories that circulated about her, but we don’t know if they’re true. We have heard stories that she was unhappy, then she married Mithun Chakraborty. We learnt about her affair then subsequent marriage with Boney Kapoor and about his first wife Mona. We may have our opinions, but we don’t have any knowledge of what really happened.</p>
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<p>It’s such a cliché of the film star to be desired by everyone but to have no one. Sridevi might have been seen as one of the world’s most beautiful women, but perhaps she found it hard to enjoy an easy home life</p>
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<p>I remember when Sridevi first became a mother, people who knew her and cared about her spoke of their happiness that now she had her own family she would no longer be lonely. I was interested in this idea of loneliness. It’s such a cliché of the film star to be desired by everyone but to have no one. Sridevi might have been seen as one of the world’s most beautiful women, but perhaps she found it hard to enjoy an easy home life.</p>
<p>Even once Sridevi was settled, new stories began to circulate to suggest she was not happy. Her punishing diet and possible cosmetic procedures were discussed mostly in negative terms, but if she had aged like other women, that would have led to a host of different stories. The violation of the privacy of this very private woman at the moment of her death must have been heartbreaking to her young daughters, her family and friends.</p>
<p>Why do we listen to these stories when we don’t know if they are true or not? Is it because it is hard for us to understand a rare creature like Sridevi, so much more beautiful, talented and famous than us? Perhaps we are jealous and think there has to be something odd about them and we can bring them down to our level? Perhaps we wish to divert attention from our own life stories, which may be dull but could look odd and incomprehensible under such scrutiny. More likely, we use stories about stars like Sridevi as ways of understanding ourselves. How much value do we put on looks? What should a woman do when she ages? How can someone so lovely have such problems? If we looked like that and had that lifestyle, our lives would be easy. Who deserves to be loved? Who should be happy?</p>
<p>Sridevi’s stardom has also inspired many and given them happiness. Among the positive appropriations are those of the LGBTQ community, which celebrates her glamour and determined struggle in a world which did not understand her. I once saw a pitch perfect dance by a presumed gay Indian celebrity to <em>Mere Haathon Mein Nau Nau Chudiyaan Hain</em>. I heard members of this community pay tributes to her in India on the weekend of her death. They remembered her beauty, the suffering she had to overcome, her mischief, fun and sexiness.</p>
<p>My friends who knew Sridevi were hugely fond of her and they kept their friendship with her throughout. They spoke of her with affection while admiring her work and dedication. Yash Chopra spoke of the famous time when, during <em>Lamhe</em>, she had to return to India for her father’s death, and then got back to rebegin work promptly, even shooting comedy sequences.</p>
<p>I met Sridevi only once when I was working on my book on Yash Chopra. It was soon after her daughter was born and I waited for her at her house. A woman entered the room and said nothing at first. Then she said to me, “Hello, I’m Sridevi.” I almost said, ‘No, you’re not.’ I too had been dazzled by her high-wattage screen presence that I didn’t recognise her gentle luminosity. I never saw her on the sets, but everyone said she had an inner light that she could switch on and off as it suited her. Now that light remains only as captured in her films, images in light.</p>
<p>Many felt that her character in her comeback film, <em>English Vinglish</em> (2012) had strong similarities with her own life. The difficulties with language were those of a Maharashtrian housewife who wanted to learn English rather than a South Indian dealing with Hindi.</p>
<p>Ignored and overlooked by even those who love her, it is when she steps out into the wider world that her inner and outer beauty are noticed. Sridevi played the role with the dignity and innocence she has had offscreen and onscreen.</p>
<p>Most of us will never know who Sridevi really was and even though there will be biographies of her, her real meaning for us lies in her wonderful films. For me, she will always be that lovely creature, stretching in a rose wet with dewdrops, filling our world with the romance of moonlight, our Chandni.</p>
<p><strong>Related Stories</strong></p>
<p><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-our-lady-of-desire" target="_blank">Our Lady of Desire</a><br /><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-thank-you-for-being-the-one" target="_blank">Thank You for Being the One</a><br /><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-the-girl-with-a-halo" target="_blank">The Girl with a Halo</a></p>
<img src="http://www.openthemagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/public%3A/Sridevi1.jpg?itok=aJeGydJC" /><div>BY: Rachel Dwyer</div><div>Node Id: 24031</div>Wed, 28 Feb 2018 17:49:08 +0000vijayopen24031 at http://www.openthemagazine.comOur Lady of Desirehttp://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/our-lady-of-desire
<p>SRIDEVI EPITOMISED A screen presence that could easily be compared to the daring and the outspokenness of Hollywood divas like Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich and Norma Shearer, who broke all conventions of a male-dominated narrative by playing roles of working-class women, the mentally unstable, divorcees, polyamorous and even scheming femme fatales. The way she came to occupy the desires of an entire nation so rapidly and that too with a massive bunch of ‘forgettable’ films will always remain an enigma.</p>
<p>It all started in the mid-1970s when the Dravidian movement split vertically in 1972, pitting screenwriter Chief Minister Karunanidhi of the DMK against the iconic MG Ramachandran of the AIADMK. On witnessing this breakup, the young Tamil generation felt their first jolt of disillusionment. The second traumatic experience hit them when both these strong chauvinist leaders capitulated under the pressure of the Emergency to make peace with Indira Gandhi and the Congress party. The euphoria of a glorious ‘free’ Tamil Nation had completely crumbled, and it was during these bitter times that a small revolution was being nurtured inside the film factory of a maverick called K Balachander. If I had to single out one film where Sridevi got her first lessons in acting for the screen, it would be <em>Moondru Mudichu</em> (‘Three Sacred Knots’, 1976). She was just 13 and had already acted in 42 films by then, from tiny bit appearances as a child artist to full-fledged character roles. Those were the days when budding actors simply accepted any ‘job’ so long as there was some income, transportation provided and free hot meals served on location. But <em>Moondru Mudichu</em> was going to be different. Here, she would encounter two more rookies who changed her future in very significant ways. She played the romantic lead with Kamal Haasan whose good friend in the film was essayed by Rajinikanth. Kamal Haasan, like Sridevi, had a string of films behind him already, but for Rajinikanth, this was his first big role.</p>
<p><em>Moondru Mudichu</em> was about the politics of desire. And Sridevi had to portray a phenomenon that could appeal to a generation of post-Independence young men and women who were entering an urban workforce driven by the ideals built by cinema and popular culture. She plays a young woman who aspires to be an educated graduate, but has only the support of an elder sister who does ‘extra’ roles in the film industry. She has a crush on Kamal Haasan, a decent-looking youth, who runs a shop selling film records. Quite appropriately, a song by Yesudas brings them closer. Haasan’s best friend Rajinikanth is a carefree cigarette-smoking character who also has a crush on her. But this ‘other’ form of desire can only express affection through harassment. Which of these two men will finally tie the Three Sacred Knots of marriage? Or will she choose to protest? A vulnerable Sridevi, who experiences both the pleasure and pain of the ruptured Dravidian imbroglio, had to travel this risky path with two men who were so different. She also had to be the crucible of K Balachander’s anger against a system dominated by the two political patriarchs.</p>
<p>There could not have been a greater studio to groom the actor’s sensibilities and at the same time help her mature as an ‘adult’ actor. In the ensuing triangular conflict, a hapless Kamal Haasan drowns in a lake while a sadistic Rajinikanth simply watches without helping. Sridevi avenges the brutal forces of this desire by taking employment as the governess in a rich widower’s house to take care of his children and estates. Coincidentally, she also comes to know that the widower is also the father of Rajinikanth. Sridevi now dons the mantle of the femme fatale from the various film-noir classics that Balachander had seen. She works hard to seduce the widower to get him to tie the three sacred knots. With this act, she is now Rajinikanth’s mother and dares him to harass her!</p>
<p>The sado-masochism of desire would soon see the trio come together in 1976 with another path-breaking film by Bharatiraja, <em>16 Vaiyithinale</em> (‘The Sixteenth Year’). Kamal Haasan recalls: “Most of the films we worked in were of the ‘disturbing’ type, requiring a certain maturity on the audiences’ part. And I found a perfect co-actor in Sridevi, balancing my characters’ anxieties, anger and sexuality. She could portray the right amount of vulnerability mixed with desires of a new women’s generation and a personal charisma added to it.” This film shifts Sridevi to the rural hinterland to portray the desires of a young village girl called Mayil (peacock in Tamil) who aspires to join the medical profession. Yet again, she is bound by the desires of three men. Kamal Haasan plays a slightly retarded servant in her household, Rajinikanth is the lumpen wastrel with two sidekicks hanging around a tea-shop, and Satyajit plays the young qualified doctor who is appointed to run the village’s primary health centre. Mayil’s heart goes out to this professional, but this city slicker sees her purely as a body. The wastrel thinks it is his birthright as the self-appointed village head to marry this pretty young woman. And the asexual servant can only think of serving her all his life.</p>
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<p>Moondru Mudichu (‘Three Sacred Knots’) was about the politics of desire. And Sridevi had to portray a phenomenon that could appeal to a generation of post-Independence young men and women who were entering an urban workforce driven by the ideals built by cinema and popular culture</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sridevi now plays agent to a new phenomenon here and we can understand it better by studying it as the rise of the ‘queer’ desire where the pea-hen assumes and adopts the so-called beauty of the ‘Mayil’, the peacock with all ‘his’ feathers spread in a semi-circle sending out mating calls. The binary of the masculine and feminine is broken down and she now embodies the only way that the young ‘betrayed’ Tamil generation can attack the ‘patriarchal’ strongholds of the Dravidian empire. Quite appropriately, the doctor runs away and the asexual servant murders the lumpen who tries to rape Mayil, for which he is sentenced to jail, leaving Mayil to face the future all by herself. Very interestingly, ten years later, in 1986 Sridevi plays the leading role in Nagina where she demonstrates this ambivalence. The cobra, which depicts male sexual virility in most cultures, is donned with equal ferocity by her as s/he avenges the trauma meted out to her by patriarchal forces. Her livid visage is compensated on the other hand by her almost gymnastic skill in performing the dance of a snake. This film established not only Sridevi’s enormous talent for such complicated dance movements, but also placed her into a mythical framework desirability for the new age.</p>
<p>IF ONE HAD to select a film that depended entirely on her sheer performance, with few narrative props to support her character, one would choose <em>Moondram Pirai</em> (‘The Lunar Phase’, 1982), remade later in Hindi as <em>Sadma</em> with the same film crew led by Balu Mahendra, another great visualiser from Chennai. The film taps yet again into another form of queer desire where Sridevi plays Viji, a young girl who suffers from a form of amnesia due to a head injury in a road accident. She is saved by Seenu, a young school teacher played by Kamal Haasan living all by himself in the cool environs of a hill station. For a full 100 minutes, we see the young helpless woman, now like a child, who has no idea of her desirability and an able-bodied male who virtually nurses an unknown beautiful woman in the lap of paradise. He has complete access to her while she cannot even access herself. The film plays between his ‘morality’ and her ‘vulnerability’ with no end in sight. An elderly lady in a neighbouring house comforts and heightens the anxieties of the narrative by dropping in occasionally. Like the asexual Adam and Eve, they inhabit a frozen time and space in which Seenu tries to revive her memories by teaching her some words and the art of writing. Balu Mahendra would recall: “I could not have found a better person than Sridevi, for such a character. She fitted herself into Viji’s character on her own, marking her performance within the space between intimacy and innocence. More often than not, I let them improvise and develop their chemistry as I saw them from a distance. This film has the least number of close-ups and yet their warm performance blended with the cool mist that surrounded us all time.” The film ends with Viji recovering her memory and completely erasing Seenu from it, while Seenu crumbles at her lack of recognition and wills himself to a kind of insanity.</p>
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<p>If one had to select a film that depended entirely on Sridevi’s sheer performance, with few narrative props to support her character, one would choose <em>Moondram Pirai</em> (‘The Lunar Phase’)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While such an asexual or almost androgynous sexuality of <em>Moondram Pirai</em> dominated the cinematic imaginary in the mid-80s, another phenomenon was being nurtured on the political horizon, and it is worth dipping into this psychosocial landscape of Tamil Nadu at this point. Chief Minister MG Ramachandran’s failing health at this point was a matter of grave concern in the state, as it was unclear who would don the mantle of leadership after his demise. For the AIADMK political coterie, his wife Janaki may have been seen as preferable, but for the people, their choice would be Jayalalithaa who was the party’s cultural secretary and popularly accepted as MGR’s consort. Do we register the platonic relationship between Jayalalithaa and MGR as if presaged by this film? Did <em>Moondram Pirai</em> prepare the audience to accept a woman as their political leader, a woman whom they would adore as a combination of the beautiful and the innocent, yet in possession of the resolve to punish any form of transgression that would disturb her status?</p>
<p>As she ascended to stardom in Telugu and Hindi cinema, however, Sridevi did not have the fortune of working with thinking filmmakers with a feel for political nuance. The focus here was mostly on dance, costume, make-up and a few scenes demanding heightened performances. True, Telugu producers paid much more and demanded less time of their women actors to complete inane macho movies such as <em>Himmatwala, Mawaali, Kalakaar, Justice Chowdary</em>, etcetera (all in 1983). What saved her and kept her in constant demand was her ability to execute some strenuous choreographic moves and keep her ‘innocent’ charm alive at all times. And amidst the clutter of immature films, she got a chance to do a complete Disneyesque fantasy in Shekhar Kapur’s <em>Mr India</em> (1987) with a screenplay written by Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar. Watching the film, you can virtually see all the lessons she must have learnt in the 26 films she did paired with Kamal Haasan. In a 10-minute-long sequence, she virtually plays Kamal Haasan enacting Charlie Chaplin in a pool room where she encounters a big bunch of baddies and bashes them at will. Some of the fine details she brings into this raunchy sequence with such gay abandon makes one sad that such talent was wasted in Bollywood, where baseless formulas and unprofessional <em>jugaad</em> were seen as the hallmark of an industry serving the cause of entertainment and something called popular culture.</p>
<p>FROM 1989 ONWARDS, she went on to do a series of films in which she plays dual roles, starting with <em>Guru, Chaalbaaz, Naaka Bandi</em>, etcetera. On a parallel note, we also note the entry of younger sirens like Madhuri Dixit, Karisma Kapoor and Aishwarya Rai who were going to offer some stiff competition in this space. Yet, after a hiatus of almost 14 years, she comes to work with an intelligent director in Gauri Shinde. <em>English Vinglish</em> may have come across as a typical example of ‘good cinema’ harking back to the 70s, where the communication of a main message was vital to its existence. Playing the role of Shashi Godbole, one can feel Sridevi yearning to go back to those Tamil films where filmmakers provided the space and courage to break out of a formula and close in on the immediate reality affecting us on a daily basis. Gauri’s bold script about a conventional housewife going to a ‘Speak Better English’ tutorial accommodates a delicately crafted amorous relationship between Shashi and her classmate, Laurent, a French chef. And there is a moment in the film, when she asserts her choice to be content with her ‘conventional’ family, where one can discover the consummate artist inside Sridevi.</p>
<p>What must it have been like for a girl like Sridevi, born in Sivakasi, where the country’s matchsticks are produced to light up kerosene stoves and <em>bidis</em>, to come and seek a career in film acting? Unlike her co-star Kamal Haasan, she was not fortunate enough to come from a prominent and well-educated family that could provide valuable emotional support. She proved that with the right attitude and a willingness to work hard, she could endeavour to become a woman of substance. Between 1976 and 1982, she acted in over 120 films—15 films a year in four different languages—before she faced Jeetendra to do <em>Himmatwala</em>, the Hindi film that would place her in the Hindi cinema orbit. Between the age of 14 and 20, a lower-middle-class girl virtually wades through a swamp of 120 films for which she had to act, dance, fight and dub her own voice, since she was proficient in all four southern languages. I can also vouch for the fact that in several cases, she must have never received the remuneration she must have been promised. Those were the days when no contracts were signed. You just worked on trust, hope and fresh air. Sridevi made it possible to move all the way up with just sheer guts, raw nerves and a storehouse of natural acting talent. Director Balu Mahendra would often tell me: “If there was one thing that was a complete luxury during those days of hectic filmmaking, it was a good night’s sleep.” May Sridevi rest in peace.</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-farewell-our-chandni-of-moonlit-romance" target="_blank">Farewell, Our Chandni of Moonlit Romance</a><br /><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-thank-you-for-being-the-one" target="_blank">Thank You for Being the One</a><br /><a href="http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/sridevi-the-girl-with-a-halo" target="_blank">The Girl with a Halo</a></p>
<img src="http://www.openthemagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/public%3A/Ladyofdesire1.jpg?itok=Tv74gSun" /><div>BY: K Hariharan</div><div>Node Id: 24025</div>Wed, 28 Feb 2018 16:26:08 +0000vijayopen24025 at http://www.openthemagazine.comThank You for Being the Onehttp://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/thank-you-for-being-the-one
<p>IT WAS 1989 AND <em>Chandni</em> had just released. She was dressed in all pink and she wore what then seemed to me like a million bangles. Her braid was so much longer than mine, I thought. I was five and it was the first time I’d caught a glimpse of this big-eyed beauty on my box-type TV set. Her expressions told a story, which you could follow even when the TV set was on mute.</p>
<p>Transfixed, I insisted on watching the entire song every time it played on TV for the next few months. I would silently study her moves. My friends and I would desperately try to draw perfect waves in the air with our scrawny arms and make fake moustaches with our plaits. My father now tells me that when <em>Chandni</em> was released, bangle shops did booming business. Schoolgirls would click their wrists together to see who’d impersonate her moves better. They were all trying to emulate the ‘<em>Mere Haathon Mein Nau Nau</em>’ girl—and so was I. For the next five years, I performed to the song at every annual day event, and won every dancing award. The nuns at our convents disapproved of tiny tots dancing to a song about a girl coming of age, but we still did. Thanks to her, early in life I discovered my rhythm, and I wasn’t alone.</p>
<p>So on the morning of February 25th when my smartphone woke me up with a news alert about Sridevi’s demise, I first switched to instant denial. I looked for the TV remote, hoping it was all a hoax. Wasn’t it just yesterday that my sister and I were re-watching <em>English Vinglish</em> (2012), wondering how she did what she did? With fingers crossed I called a close friend to ask her if it was indeed true. We spent the next few minutes silently sobbing on the phone. A part of our childhood was gone forever.</p>
<p>A few icons have bid goodbye to us in this generation, but this one was personal. “It was almost like losing a family member,” a neighbour said to me, with teary eyes. She was right. Very few actors have been able to become so deep a part of the lives of their audiences. Sridevi did that and so much more.</p>
<p>For someone who started acting at the age of four, the arc lights were all she knew. “I don’t even know how to boil water,” she’d said to me unabashedly, just before the release of her film <em>English Vinglish</em>. It was the only time I’d interviewed her, that too with her daughters. I remember waiting for her in the hotel lobby just before the photo shoot for the story. She walked in, on time, in a blue sweatshirt and black track pants. Her hair was bundled up in a messy bun, she carried a massive black handbag and her makeup-less face was nearly hidden by oversized sunglasses. “I hope we’re not late,” she said to me in a shaky voice as we entered the corridors of the hotel. She walked fast, holding her daughters close, conscious of the attention she was attracting. She seemed nervous, and barely made eye contact. For a split second I thought, ‘Is this her? Is this the woman I grew up watching?’</p>
<p>It indeed was. Inexplicably, she transformed the minute she was in make-up and costume, in front of the camera. Her radiance wasn’t an exaggeration. Energy and vivacity had replaced the inhibition. How could the same person be so different on and off camera? We still don’t have an answer for that. “I did not go to school. I did not have friends like my daughters now do. I couldn’t even afford to make mistakes and get punished for them. I was never allowed to be normal,” she’d said to me, with a smile.</p>
<p>What a lost childhood gave us was an actor who owned every moment on screen—from the little girl who played Sivaji Ganesan’s adopted daughter in the Tamil hit <em>Babu</em> (1971) to playing lead roles at the age of 14 in films like <em>Moondru Mudichu</em> (1976) to becoming one of the few south Indian actors to cross over to Hindi cinema and claim superstar status of her own.</p>
<p>Among her earliest co-stars, Kamal Haasan says, “She could barely speak Hindi or English, but it was never a barrier for her. In fact, she wasn’t as confident during the Tamil films that we did together as she was during her work in Hindi cinema. I was a child actor myself and it was almost like we shared a parallel journey, except that she became so popular in Hindi films that she never looked back.” Before the Hindi film <em>Julie</em> (1983), Sridevi had already done over 25 films down south. In fact, she was doing so well in Tamil and Telugu cinema that moving to Hindi cinema was not an easy decision. “I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do Hindi films, because I couldn’t speak a word of Hindi. My parents and my then directors like K Balachander encouraged me to go ahead,” she’d said to me.</p>
<p>Thankfully she did, and today she leaves us with over 300 films and characters that have immortalised her in our minds. Sridevi was never the one to give us a studied, calculated performance. Her irreverence was her strength and her ability to emote was her biggest tool as a performer. She played the drama queen as effortlessly as the comedian in a scene. Often within the same film she would transform into two different characters, and one could barely tell it’s the same person playing them.</p>
<p>Like in <em>Moondram Pirai/ Sadma</em> (1983) where she went from a normal girl to mentally-challenged person, or in <em>Chaalbaaz</em> (1989), where she plays the role of twins, one a shy and the other an extrovert. She went on to play six double roles in her career, including in masterpiece films like <em>Lamhe</em> (1991) and <em>Khuda Gawah</em> (1992), proving her versatility.“I studied many actors I worked with carefully, but they would never know I was doing that. Like Kamal Haasan. He would always express himself just the right amount, without ever going over the top and it always amazed me how he did that,” she told me.</p>
<blockquote>
<p> </p>
<p>Her co-star Adil Hussain, who calls her a “complete actor”, adds, “She was the kind of actor who could really represent the Natyashastra of Indian abhinaya. She was the epitome of a true form of acting, as she had mastered all the nine emotions and the nuances that came with them</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In that era, it was rare to have someone, especially a woman, stand out in films that were so predominantly male centric. Shekhar Kapur, who worked with her in <em>Mr India</em> (1987), remembers Sridevi as an actor who’d never give up. “<em>Mr India</em> was about a man who transformed himself to change the world. But what Sridevi did in the film would surprise me at every go. She’d make such subtle yet visible improvisations that enhanced the scenes I wrote. During the Charlie Chaplin sequence, she said to me, ‘Don’t worry, we should go with the flow.’ Only a person who is a master of her craft can deliver the performance she did in my film,” Kapur says.</p>
<p>My own favourite is still <em>Lamhe</em>, where she plays a young girl in love with a much older man. Keeping her innocence intact, she beautifully portrayed the coming of age of a girl who had always been starry eyed about romance. <em>Lamhe</em> was not just ahead of its time, it was also a performance that evoked great empathy.</p>
<p>“It’s not easy to be an actor. These girls will never know what it takes and how much one has to sacrifice,” she said to me that day as her elder daughter Janhvi threw a tantrum about her make-up. She immediately reprimanded Janhvi and got back to the interview. This was 2012 and it was Sridevi’s comeback to films after a 15-year break. When she was pregnant with her first daughter, she took a call. She did not want her children to grow up without a mother. She never thought of balancing cinema and motherhood, as she felt missing time with her children would not be worth it. “Once there was an emergency fire drill in my building and Khushi had just been born. In a rush, I took some important items, picked up Janhvi and walked out of the door. For a few minutes I’d forgotten that I had another baby too. That’s how taxing it can be. So I was happy being a full-time mother,” she said.</p>
<p>Despite the sabbatical, her comeback in <em>English Vinglish</em> made other actors of this generation re-evaluate their own work. Sridevi excelled as a middle-aged housewife fighting for dignity within her own family. Her mannerisms reminded us of our own mothers who’d often faced identity issues at home. Gauri Shinde, the director of <em>English Vinglish</em>, says, “I would be intimidated to approach her because she would barely talk, but eventually we broke the ice. She brought such truth to her character in the film that it was beyond what I’d conceived on paper.”</p>
<p>Her co-star Adil Hussain, who calls her a “complete actor”, adds, “She was the kind of actor who could really represent the Natyashastra of Indian <em>abhinaya</em>. She was the epitome of a true form of acting, as she had mastered all the nine emotions and the nuances that came with them.”</p>
<p>For someone who was usually on such a pedestal in her professional life, Sridevi’s personal life was tumultuous. There were times she was forced to take up films she did not want to. Her father’s demise came when she was at the peak of her career. Her romantic affiliations, including her relationship with Boney Kapoor who was already married, became fodder for gossip. The pressure of staying on top was immense, and she was clear she never wanted her girls to go through it. It was during this very interview that she categorically said she would get Janhvi and Khushi married off before they considered joining films. “I don’t want them to face this industry because it can get very brutal,” were her words to me.</p>
<p>But, of course, something had changed. Till a few days before her death, Sridevi was regularly seen at media events with daughter Janhvi who is soon to make her debut as an actor. In a TV interview during her last film, <em>Mom</em> (2017), she said, “I am protective about them, but I can’t be possessive. My daughters have their own journeys to make and I won’t stand in the way of that.”</p>
<p>She was always known to be painfully shy, but she was never short of compassion for those around her. Her make-up person Subhash Shinde, who worked with her for over 20 years, says, “She wouldn’t say much, but I knew if I had a problem she would be there to help me.” Sajal Ali, her co-star in <em>Mom</em>, has her own special memories. Ali says, “My mother was dying of cancer and I would often rush into the vanity van and cry my heart out during the shoot. The only person who was there for me at that time was Sridevi Ma’am and I will always be grateful to her.”</p>
<p>Having performed for nearly five decades, she has inspired and influenced many generations. An actor friend, Veena Nair, is surprised how she ended up watching an entire interview with Sridevi just a few hours before her demise was announced. My sister watched <em>Mr India</em> just a day before she passed away. Amitabh Bachchan who has done many films with her expressed a sense of restlessness on Twitter just hours before the news broke. I don’t believe these are coincidences, but this was the cumulative effect her persona had on us.</p>
<p>Today, as I walk the back road of Lokhandwala in Andheri (where she lived), I see at least a few hundred people waiting to get a last glimpse at their superstar. After Madhubala and Meena Kumari, who knew it would be Sridevi who’d leave us sooner than she deserved. People here are quiet. They share silent stares, as though aware they have lost something in common. It seems like everyone, from housewives to college students, to autorickshaw drivers to the lady who sells <em>mogra</em> outside her home, are still trying to process her unexpected demise.</p>
<p>We laughed with her. We cried with her. Thank you, Sridevi, for the gags and giggles, for the dances and drama. You will be missed. Thank you for being you.</p>
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<img src="http://www.openthemagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/public%3A/Thanksyou1.jpg?itok=hs0dIUv3" /><div>BY: Divya Unny</div><div>Node Id: 24024</div>Wed, 28 Feb 2018 15:56:15 +0000vijayopen24024 at http://www.openthemagazine.comThe Girl with a Halohttp://www.openthemagazine.com/article/sridevi-1963-2018/the-girl-with-a-halo
<p><em>It began with a word of encouragement from Kamaraj when the legendary Congressman noticed a cute little girl, not yet four, with her father, a young lawyer, in Chennai. Lord Murugan was her first role, and nine years later at 13, she would play Rajinikanth’s stepmother.</em></p>
<p>VETERAN CONGRESS LEADER and celebrated kingmaker K Kamaraj, considered responsible for charting the course of many national leaders including Indira Gandhi, was also instrumental in directing the destiny of a film star—Sridevi. One fateful day, Kamaraj was busy as ever in a discussion with partymen at his residence on Thirumalai Pillai Road, Thyagaraya Nagar, Chennai. They were analysing the reasons for his electoral debacle from his hometown and constituency, Virudhunagar. Ayyappan, a young lawyer and a Congressman, was among them. He came from the village of Meenampatti, in Sivakasi taluk, Virudhunagar district.</p>
<p>In that political meeting was a bored little child, hardly four years old, pacing the room and gazing at the white walls lined with pictures of Gandhi and Nehru. She was getting restless. She pulled at the corner of her father’s <em>veshti</em> and whispered into his ears, “<em>Polama</em>?” (Shall we go?) Kamaraj noticed her and asked, “Whose child is she?” “My daughter, sir,” replied a beaming Ayyappan. “Bless her sir!” he requested. “How old is she? Has she started her schooling?” “She will be four this August. We are trying to put her in music and dance. Her mother wants her to be a film star.” “That’s fine. But don’t stop schooling her,” said Kamaraj, and turned towards Kannadasan, a popular lyricist and a partyman, and told him, “Help this cute child, if you can.”</p>
<p>Ayyappan followed up with Kannadasan, who advised him to meet MA Thirumugam, a filmmaker who was working on a project for the legendary producer Sandow MMA Chinappa Thevar. <em>Thunaivan</em> is a devotional film on the plight of a devotee of Lord Murugan. Sridevi was given a small role as Lord Murugan in that film, and she stole the show. Posters and advertisements in the press featured her prominently.</p>
<p>The way NTR became the image of Krishna for the Telugu audience, Sridevi became Murugan for Tamil cinemagoers. Filmmakers were rushing to cash in on her charming smile and divine looks. She was cast as Murugan in a string of films starring top actors like Sivaji Ganesan, Jayalalithaa and KR Vijaya. It was B Nagi Reddy, a doyen of the south Indian film industry, who dared to switch off the halo around her to deploy her in human roles. Yet, he decided to give her the role of a little boy, not that of a girl, in his blockbuster <em>Nam Nadu</em>. It was a film made on MGR’s request, who was bitter with Karunanidhi then, and was contemplating his own party. He was keen to test the waters before launching his political party and requested Nagi Reddy to help him out. Reddy suggested that they remake his Telugu hit, <em>Kathanayakudu</em>, which featured NT Rama Rao, in Tamil. MGR agreed.</p>
<p>Reddy recollects the success of the film in his memoir <em>Many Shades Make a Rainbow: Reminiscences of B Nagi Reddy</em>:</p>
<p>‘When it was released, we both went to Mekala Theatre to watch the reaction of the viewers. Except for the manager, no one was aware of our presence. It was a pleasant evening and the doors had been kept wide open. MGR stood leaning on one side of the door and I was leaning on the other. There was a scene in which Jayalalithaa, the heroine of the movie, appeared singing the song ‘<em>Vangaiya Vathiyar Ayya</em> (Welcome our leader!)’ to welcome MGR after his victory in the elections. The audience rose as one man, cheering, clapping, whistling. There were cries: “We want to see the scene again! Repeat the scene!” We then advised the manager to oblige the audience. The reel was rewound and the sequence was shown again. I turned to MGR. His eyes were filled with tears of joy. He hugged me. “O Reddiar! I have received the people’s acceptance!’</p>
<p>Such a hit <em>Nam Nadu</em> was. Though Sridevi had a minuscule role as Raja, one of the children of protagonist’s brother Durai (MGR), she became popular because of the hit song <em>Nalla Perai Vanga Vendum</em> (‘We should earn a good name’). That song featured her with MGR and the ‘boy’ became a darling of the masses. Reddy’s find became an instant hit in Telugu cinema too. Within two years of her debut, she became the most popular child actor in south India.</p>
<p>While her mother’s dream had come true, her father’s promise to Kamaraj was in jeopardy. Ayyappan had promised Kamaraj that he would ensure Sridevi continued her schooling. She did attend school and was a good student, but balancing a film career and studies was proving harder than expected. Her parents even hired a teacher to accompany her when she went out for shoots. Later, in an interview to <em>Filmfare</em> magazine, she would admit: “But after a point, this wasn’t practical. I had to choose between studies and films. I chose films.” Formal schooling aside, her mother had arranged language tutors for her, so unlike her character in <em>English Vinglish</em>, she was conversant in six languages, including English.</p>
<p>As a teenager, she harboured dreams of attending college, but at the age of 13, she was cast in the role of Rajinikanth’s stepmother in K Balachander’s <em>Moondru Mudichu</em>. Call it ambition or destiny, her career made her a woman in a child’s body. And that was the end of her childhood. Despite her age, she outsmarted two talented thespians, Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth, with her sterling performance in the film. Her teens were spent giving hit after hit in Tamil and Telugu: <em>16 Vayathinile</em> (1977),<em> Sigappu Rojakkal</em> (1978), <em>Varumayin Niram Sivappu </em>(1980), <em>Meendum Kokila</em> (1981), <em>Premabhishekam</em> (1981), <em>Moondram Pirai</em> (1982).</p>
<p>Though she had made a foray into Hindi films when she was just 12 (<em>Julie</em>), she conquered Bollywood in the prime of youth, with films like<em> Solva Sawan</em> (1979), <em>Himmatwala</em> (1983), <em>Sadma</em> (1983), <em>Mawaali </em>(1983), <em>Tohfa</em> (1984), <em>Naya Kadam</em> (1984), <em>Maqsad</em> (1984), <em>Masterji</em> (1985), <em>Nazrana</em> (1987), <em>Mr India</em> (1987), <em>Waqt Ki Awaz</em> (1988) and <em>Chandni </em>(1989).</p>
<p>Thrust into fame prematurely, Sridevi was robbed of a chance to be what she really wanted to be. She was always somebody on the screen, and for the screen. Actors may cry aloud onscreen for others, but often, they cannot even cry silently for themselves.</p>
<p>Yash Chopra, in an interview with Karan Johar in <em>The Indian Express</em>, remembered the day Ayyappan died. Sridevi was shooting in Manchester for<em> Lamhe</em>. Everyone in the crew, including Chopra, knew the inevitable had happened to Sridevi’s father. Everyone except Sridevi. No one had the courage to break the news to her. She was simply told that Ayyappan was critical and was advised to visit him. Upon reaching home, Sridevi got the shock of her life. But despite it, she called Chopra back and told him that she couldn’t return for the next 16 days. On the 17th day, she returned, as promised, and shot a comedy scene with Waheeda Rahman.</p>
<p>Greater woes were waiting for her with her mother’s failing health. A botched operation at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, one of the world’s premier hospitals, sealed her fate. On May 26th, 1995, Rajeswari Ayyappan, 59 years old, underwent surgery for a malignant tumour on the left side of her brain. The tumour, however, was left intact because her neurosurgeon operated on the wrong side of Rajeswari’s brain, turning the woman who was managing Sridevi’s career into a ‘vegetable’. “My mother used to handle my properties, my affairs, my taxes, my career,” Sridevi told her New York lawyer Harvey Wachsman when she was suing the hospital. “Now she is like a vegetable,” she added. The death of her parents, who made her a star loved by millions, left her lonely. She married after losing both parents, at the age of 33.</p>
<p>Be it <em>Moondru Mudichu </em>or<em> English Vinglish</em>, Sridevi portrayed the women of her times, breaking barriers with their will, almost all alone and rising above the odds. There lies the secret of her success— many were able to identify themselves in her screen roles. Yet, what was she in her real life? Yes, she was beautiful; she was talented; she was famous; she was determined. But was she happy within? Or seized in solitude? Mourners from Meenampatti to Mumbai may seek answers in her death.</p>
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<img src="http://www.openthemagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/public%3A/Thegirl.jpg?itok=yvwF6ubn" /><div>BY: Maalan Narayanan</div><div>Node Id: 24022</div>Wed, 28 Feb 2018 14:05:41 +0000vijayopen24022 at http://www.openthemagazine.com